You know something? I just figured out how to pick the historical loser:
He goes on the offensive, decrying how he’s under attack.
Civil War: The South whines about “northern aggression” the whole time it’s racking up huge pro-slavery wins throughout the 1840s and 1850s. (Fugitive Slave Law, Dred Scott, “Squatter’s Sovereignty.”)
WWII: Nazis use France and the Jews as a vindication for their game, get stomped.
Korea: North Koreans use S. Korean dictator as vindication, get stomped, have asses saved at last minute by Chinese.
Vietnam: Same game, only this time after the Tet Offensive, it’s the Democratic Party who makes North Vietnam safe for Communism by refusing to keep arming the South.
Bolivia: Pick one.
Al Quaeda: Butchers everybody in sight in order to “defend Islam” from the west. The West only decides it gives a rat’s ass when the bombs and planes go off, and whip them everywhere they find them.
Arabs against Israel: Pick one.
Mexico: A government so corrupt that its best and bravest would rather risk death in the desert in order to be minor criminals in a northern country where it’s cold, nobody gives a rat’s ass whether you live or die, and they speak a weird language, than continue to stay in a place where you have to pay serious bribes just to get and hold a minimum-wage job. Status: amazingly enough, kinda-sorta growing a middle class as it outgrows the victim rhetoric, pending Chavista revolts in Oaxaca.
Russia: full of grievances, currently selling its women and collapsing demographically…
Iran: full of mullahs, currently selling its women while collapsing demographically…
JimDesu
/ November 21, 2006By that measure, then you would have to predict Evangelical/Charismatic Christianity also going down the toilet, since “everywhere [they]‘re under assault by gays and socialists” (not a real quote, just a general rhetorical gestalt). And given that they’ve been kicking the inclusive church’s behinds (UU’s, Catholics, mainstream Protestants, &c.), that doesn’t sound right.
Perhaps it would be better to say it’s the aggressor that is always banging the drum of the aggrieved.
happycrow
/ November 21, 2006False comparison: evangelists are not assaulting gays… except for the rare bad apple, obviously.
Mike
/ November 21, 2006Yeah, this is how it seems to work. But I do think Jim has a point on the aggressor view. They always seem to need a reason and it usually seems to be someone is holding them down, selling (or sold) them out, getting ready to attack them, inhibiting their “rights” or something to that effect. I rarely hear a truely legit complaint such as (of all things) The War of 1812 and the British denial of freedom of the seas and impressing merchant seamen (yes, other very un-legit reasons were driving this too, but that is a good example of a legit suppression of rights). Seems to be a legit liberal arguement for why the US needs to “fix” things. The vast ultra-right wing conspiracy is brainwashing our kids, the economy is in the tank, the Patriot Act is infringing and stealing all our rights, etc. Then the Dems win, and suddenly the economy is on the up and up, we need to beef up the homeland security and so on.
This is one of the reasons I always liked the Romans, they just went after someone and never really gave a reason or just said “For the People and Senate of Rome. We like it here and we’ll take it thanks or no”. There is just something refreshing about someone who goes after someone and doesn’t even bother trying to justify it to others(we have our reasons, its none of your business so piss off, join in or shut up), or is blunt about the reasons (we want land, women, food, water, surfing rights or whatever and we again don’t care if you like it or not).
Ah, I wish for the honesty of the Romans.
JimDesu
/ November 21, 2006What I meant, in their case, is that Evangelists are conquering other church’s (competing for membership), not assaulting gays (disowning them, etc, but not assaulting except in the case of a few very well known @sshole churches).
happycrow
/ November 22, 2006Yes, but that’s an odd comparison to make, b/c by definition, all Christian churches evangelize and therefore compete with other churches for followers. It’s only the seriously old-world churches like the Yezidis who don’t do that…
JimDesu
/ November 22, 2006Sure, but most don’t take an aggrieved tone of others’ (varying)tolerance.
coffespaz
/ November 22, 2006I don’t think that is a fair comparison, as not all evangelical churches are the same. Though many of the newer churches do not “compete” for membership, there are still many who do in fact take the “aggrieved tone” you spoke of, and hence fit into the category of the “older churches” as far as the lack of or “varying” tolerance.
James
/ November 27, 2006The Evangelicals that I grew up with had no problem castigating the gay population. This may be a case of geographical identification JimDesu. Where you are at, castigating gays is the logical eqiuavalent of the Romans castigating gays. If they make up 20 percent or better of the local population, you are going to see some ‘give and take’ there. Believe me, if you start supporting a gay stance in the Bible belt, it does not matter what your church wants you to believe, you are automatically a minority. The Roman Catholics here have had the problem of gay priests popping up, and there is no mercy. Not only are they gay, the are the Evil Roman Catholics, and that just compounds the problem.
JimDesu
/ December 1, 2006Not even any UUs in the bible belt?? Everywhere I’ve been they’ve always been the last resort for the modern equivalent of tax-collectors & prostitutes.
jonathon
/ December 5, 2006UUs are rare here. There is a UU church on Lower Greenville in Dallas, but except for there UUs appear to do everything to avoid drawing attention to themselves. This is after all, the birthplace of the Scofield Church and the Nazarenes…
happycrow
/ December 5, 2006And the message that draws folks to the UU isn’t really an issue here, as the UU really hits the whole “community” thing hard… and that’s not really lacking here. To a *certain* extent, there’s not much difference there between the UU and some of the megachurches, though the latter are obviously straight-up low-Protestant Christian, rather than universalist.